


like pulling teeth

by catpoop



Category: Bad Samaritan (2018), Jessica Jones (TV)
Genre: Cohabitation, Domestic Violence, M/M, Mild Gore, cale... does not, kvein likes surprises
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-08
Updated: 2019-10-08
Packaged: 2020-11-27 12:10:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20948129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catpoop/pseuds/catpoop
Summary: Even if Cale has his disagreeable (and unromantic) tendencies, Kilgrave tries to add a little spice to their relationship. It goes about as well as you'd expect.





	like pulling teeth

**Author's Note:**

> this came up in a convo w a calegrave mutual... he's writing a fic based off the same core idea so keep an eye out for it!

The force that strikes Kilgrave’s right cheek squeezes a laugh from his lungs, but Cale isn’t smiling at all. His lips are pulled into such a scowl that Kilgrave wants to kiss them better, though it’s a little difficult when he’s currently being held by the collar at arm’s length. The punches aren’t helping, either.

“You fucking _imbecile_,” Cale is roaring, though what for, Kilgrave isn’t too sure. He finds his attention drifting off, then back to the issue at hand, then to probable causes for Cale’s anger. There’s always a pattern…

Someone messed with his belongings. Someone messed with his routines. Someone – and Kilgrave wonders idly if it might be this – accidentally commanded him to do something he didn’t want to do and now he’s feeling terrified and defensive.

“You don’t need to be scared,” he says. It turns out to be the wrong thing to say, if the frequency with which the punches start raining down on his face and chest are any indication.

“You shut the _fuck_ up,” Cale pants, “You shut the fuck up, you cut your own tongue out, and _think_ about what you’ve done. Or I’ll do it for you.”

“What, think?” Kilgrave raises a brow. It pulls at a cut on his temple.

Cale pulls his face in close. “I’ll cut your tongue out. You know I can, Kevin.”

Kilgrave shrugs, staying silent for once, and Cale finally lets him go. He thuds to the floor with a yelp.

“Piss off,” Cale barks. “Stop getting blood on my floor.”

“It’s _my_ floor too,” Kilgrave mutters, but a sharp look shuts him up.

Sulking, he stumbles into the nearest bathroom. His jaw aches, and the whole lower half of his face is starting to burn. He spits blood into the sink and curses Cale’s name. The anger doesn’t last long though, because he is soon distracted.

By a loose molar, of all things, and Kilgrave reaches eagerly in to give it a sharp tug, tasting blood and the pop of nerves as it comes free. It is red and bloody and cracked in his fingers.

“Huh.”

The idea pops into his brain as fast as Cale’s mood had switched, and Kilgrave lights up. “_Huh,_” he repeats. This will be fun – he knows it already.

Cale is suspicious when Kilgrave approaches later in the afternoon, beaming and holding an ice-pack to his cheek, but he brushes it off quickly. The man’s always been a little dim, and none of the previous beatings have done a single thing to change his carefree mood. Cale leans back and sets his phone down as Kilgrave sits down beside him.

“What.”

“Hi, darling.”

His suspicion is back up to a hundred. “_What_.”

“You know I cherish our relationship. And you know that every relationship needs a little _spontaneity_ to keep it going.”

Cale hates spontaneity. “No.”

Kilgrave shushes him. “Soo… I left a surprise for you. In the house. Try and find it!”

“You left what… _where_?” Cale says slowly. Even if Kilgrave’s moved himself in for more than a year, it’s still _his_ house. And one thing he can’t stand is people disturbing the carefully-crafted peace he’s cultivated within. “What did you do, Kevin.”

“It’s a surprise!” Kilgrave grins at him from behind the ice-pack.

Cale processes the words, then processes them again. He lurches, and starts to feel the world seize up around him, the coffee table before him blurring into obscurity then reappearing magnified. His nails are biting marks into his palm.

“What did you do, Kevin.” He repeats. “_Where_ is it?”

“I’m not telling you – it’s a surprise.” Kilgrave says lazily from his spot on the couch, Cale now standing up and pacing the living room. He is barely aware of the way his own feet contact the floor.

_Fuck._ It’s just like Kevin to spite him twice in one day, and every illusion of peace abandons Cale as he stomps out of the room. Kevin _knows_ how big the house is and yet he _still – _

Cale starts on the ground floor.

The sky has long turned dark by the time he uncovers the _surprise_, having methodically unpacked and repacked every single room, Kilgrave lurking in his periphery with that same dumb grin on his face.

“Why are you scanning your hard drive?” He asks, or, “Why is all the furniture upside down?” and Cale has to resist the urge to beat Kilgrave over the head with whatever is in reach.

When he finds it, he does actually throttle Kilgrave, the man just a step behind him.

“You found it!” Kilgrave wheezes, turning a little pale. “See, it’s like when the tooth fairy – ”

Cale doesn’t hear the rest of his explanation, because the man has already fallen unconscious to the floor. He leaves Kilgrave there before walking back to his bed, to fix his stare on the brown stain on both pillow and bedsheet. And in between them, the shiny dull crown of a tooth. He nearly gags, and then he does, and only agility gets Cale into the en suite in time to hurl curses into the toilet bowl.

He eyes Kilgrave still on the floor, then the _wreck_ of his bed, and comes to a decision. 

One, he’s burning his bed and all its furnishings.

And two, Kilgrave will be losing a lot more teeth before Cale is letting him back into the house.

**Author's Note:**

> comments and kudos are much appreciated!
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/hashtag_yikes)  
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